The letter from A Serving Umno Youth Bureau Member is one of the more amusing things I have read from Umno in a while ([#1] The other side of the Mahafiraun II [/#], March 28).

What a pity to know that someone, somewhere within the Umno Youth - and it's bureau at that - is secretly able to "call a spade a spade" as the writer says, but not able to say it out loud.

To borrow more of his words, I "laud" the writer for his "quite credible albeit pretentious attempt" in trying to show us he is a well-balanced, thoughtful and an intelligent person in Umno Youth.

I cannot help but giggle at the way he does it though.

Note:

- His name-dropping, with no less an authority than Prof KS Jomo (with whom he has conducted "discussions and research");

- his kind and condescending explanation of the crisis - or non-crisis as he argues - in "layman's terms", for the less educated among us; and

- his impressive references to possible qualifications as "an economist" and "a financial analyst" and as a possible member of the Malaysian Youth Professionals Association, which comes complete with a groovy acronym (Promuda).

The thing is, I quite agree with what he has said in arguing that Dr Mahathir Mohamad deserves (much) less benefit of doubt with regard to the Anwar Ibrahim case and that the capital controls were mostly redundant. I also think Prof Jomo is worth quoting.

So why am I nit-picking and wasting time making fun of the writer's "credible albeit pretentious" letter?

Because, while it describes what has happened with some objectivity, it doesn't draw the conclusions that follow with much conviction. You may argue that capital controls and Anwar's case are too complex to pronounce simple judgments on, but I think it is not too distorting to say:

1) Mahathir is not necessarily the great saviour of our country, and certainly not because of the capital controls; and

2) Anwar's trial was a farce. (I don't support Anwar either, but I do think it was a farce, objective old me.) I don't know why Dr M didn't do something about it.

So why does the writer not say this?

For "a seemingly articulate person and of sound mind" (sic), it confounds me as to why the writer bothers trying to convince us of his objectivity, intelligence, connections and convictions, when he does not have the moral fibre to come to the conclusion that a party living with these travesties of government is not much worth being a member of, much less a serving youth bureau member.

It's certainly not worth writing anonymous letters in service of it.

Or maybe I'm being extremely harsh on the writer and it's just that Umno's public relations department has picked up a modicum of sophistication.